Outdoor Education

Learning Outside the Classroom (LOtC) is a fundamental part of what makes St Laurence a great school. We offer a wide range of experiences to our young people, including a whole year group residential to Black Rock in Year 9, the Duke of Edinburgh Award, foreign exchange trips, a Business Studies trip to New York, History trips to Normandy and Berlin and a trip to Romania supporting charitable projects.

As we come out of the pandemic, St Laurence staff are already planning new experiences for children across all Key Stages. Keep an eye on this page for updates throughout the year. As well as residential trips and overseas visits, we offer numerous day trips across all subjects, as well as a wide range of St Laurence Extra after school clubs.

As a school we place a real emphasis on these experiences as we passionately believe that extracurricular activities give young people the confidence to interact socially with others, extend their social networks beyond existing friendship groups, and provide them with new skills and abilities. There is also a growing body of evidence that links regular and sustained participation in extracurricular activities and positive impacts educationally, in terms of achievement and educational outcomes.

Above all, extracurricular activities are a chance to have fun, unwind and relieve the pressures of a busy school day. We hope that you will encourage your child to sign up to as many trips and extracurricular clubs as they can.

Year 7 Challenge and Team Building Day

The purpose of this event is to celebrate with Year 7 students their first term at St Laurence School and provide an opportunity for the students to work together and strengthen new friendships, through a variety of small group activities, within their Learning Group and in an environment that is ‘outside of the classroom’. As part of this event, students will take part in a carousel of 4 different activities including orienteering, rounders, team building and problem solving.

Year 8 –

Pending … details to follow.

Years 9 – Black Rock Residential

This is a purpose built activity week for St Laurence in the Quantocks. We have been visiting the Centre for nearly 20 years and this has built into a really challenging experience where students have the opportunity to participate in High and Low ropes, Archery, Kayaking, Mountain Biking, Climbing and Caving as well as a series of problem solving and team building activities. We stay at Hill House, a large Georgian building, not far from Bridgewater, which offers a very flexible programme in superb surroundings. Again, this is a residential trip that we encourage the whole of the year group to participate.

Years 10 to 13 – The Duke of Edinburgh Award

The Duke of Edinburgh (DofE) programme at St Laurence School is open to all students in Years 10 -13. Please see the download section below for all forms and relevant information related to the DofE programme.